<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>wandering in reverse by kaminoko_x</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23442757">wandering in reverse</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaminoko_x/pseuds/kaminoko_x'>kaminoko_x</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Sword Art Online (Anime &amp; Manga)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Anxiety Attacks, Attempted Sexual Assault, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 13:07:12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,803</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23442757</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaminoko_x/pseuds/kaminoko_x</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Survivors come home like strangers in a strange land.</p><p>Or: SAO players wake up, readjust, learn to cope.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Minor or Background Relationship(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>184</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. dragonsteeth</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Warning: Any kind of technical detail in this should not be trusted. I did absolutely no research on things like tasers or Japan's justice system. I did a tiny bit of research on anxiety attacks but I have never had one so I cannot guaranteed accuracy. If you need info on them, please Google for official sources.</p><p>Quarantine has given me too much and too little time. Simultaneously.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Her parents calls her Keiko. The nurses call her Ayano-chan. Silica flinches every time.</p><p>-</p><p>The first thing Silica does when she gets to go home from the hospital is pick up her cat, Pina’s namesake, and cry into her fur. Silica cries because there are days she never thought she’d see this Pina again, and today it hits harder than ever that she’ll never see her other Pina again.</p><p>The moment her mother leaves her to settle back into her room, Silica explores. The space is both strange and familiar, the little mementos on her shelves and the cute stationary on her desk. In an effort to make it a little more Silica, she sets up a little shrine on her desk, sneaking a few supplies from the family shrine downstairs. She doesn’t have a picture of what she wants, so she digs around her shelves, grabbing a sleek feather, saved from a school trip, and a little origami paper lily, given to her by her best friend IRL. After some thought, she adds her broken SAO NerveGear cartridge to the collection, carefully placing it right next to the incense holder - her mom definitely won’t touch anything if that’s there. The end result is a poor substitute of a memorial, but it’s the best she can do without involving her parents.</p><p>Silica lights the incense and remembers her fallen companions.</p><p>-</p><p>A week after they all wake up, the survivors find that they have monsters waking in their brains. Paranoia dogs Silica steps, and she’s not the only one - every survivor she knows has watchful eyes and listening ears. Her own monster follows her home and never leaves her. The door to her house is so flimsy, and the lock is a combination type that is much too easy to hack. Her room door doesn’t even lock. It gets worse when she leaves home, tension cramping her shoulders every moment she’s going to school on the train, hair trigger alert senses nearly screaming any time someone is near her where she can’t see. Red hair on a classmate - too close to Rosalia’s red - makes her flinch. Silica doesn’t have Pina to watch her back anymore. It’s terrifying.</p><p>Things come to a head when a man tries to get handsy with her on the train. She panics and slams him away with open palms, but it’s packed, and he only bounces off the backs of other startled people. She scrambles for weapons that don’t exist, finding only a ballpoint pen in the outer pocket of her bag. He tries to grab her again, so she stabs out her pen at him, shrieking. He staggers, clutching his face. Silica twists her wrist out of his grip, and people are shouting now, but she isn’t listening, clawing and shoving her way out of the train car. People spill out of the train doors and out of her way, yelping as they fall. Silica sprints out of the station and she doesn’t stop running until her legs nearly give out, wishing for her daggers and armour every step of the way.</p><p>-</p><p>Holed up in a coffee shop washroom, Silica takes a moment to catch her breath. A drop of cold lands on her hand, and she pauses, squinting up at the ceiling. There doesn’t seem to be a leak, so what -</p><p>Oh. She’s crying.</p><p>Silica doesn’t have time for this, it isn’t a safe zone, she’s not safe yet -</p><p>One hand over her mouth to muffle the sobs, she digs her phone out of her bag and tries to find the first number she can call.</p><p>Lisbeth picks up on the second ring.</p><p>“Hey Silica, what’s up?”</p><p>“I - help,” she chokes out.</p><p>“Silica,” Lisbeth says, snapping into full blacksmith mode focus, “Are you hurt?”</p><p>“No,” Silica says, trying to breathe through the tears.</p><p>“Are you somewhere safe?” Lisbeth asks.</p><p>“Mob clear area,” she says shakily, “But I need a safe zone to recoup.”</p><p>“Send me a map pin, I’ll find one for you. Do you want a rescue party?”</p><p>“I can’t take the train right now,” Silica says.</p><p>“Got it. I’m gonna send whoever is closest, so it might not be me. I’ll text you details, sit tight, okay?”</p><p>Fifteen minutes later, she’s managed to calm her crying into even, shuddery breaths. Her phone pings with a text from Lisbeth.</p><p>
  <em> Your rescue party is on the street. Harry One from Fuurinkazan, he’ll get you to the Dicey. </em>
</p><p>She’s met Fuurinkazan only once. <em> They’re dependable clearers and damn good backup</em>, Kirito had said when he’d introduced her. <em> Good guys too</em>. Lisbeth clearly knows them too. Silica breathes, and makes her way out of the bathroom, pausing to buy two pastries. It’s the least she could do to make up for monopolizing one of their bathroom stalls for twenty minutes.</p><p>There’s a man in a leather jacket standing just a little ways outside the coffee shop door, like Lisbeth said. He’s tall and clean shaven, with hair cut close to his scalp. He pushes off the wall when she exits, gives her a quick once over.</p><p>“You gotta be Ayano-san, right?” he asks, waving, “Aah, Lis-kun was right when she said I might remember your face. Silica with the dragon, right? You partied with Kirito sometimes. I’m Yokota Tatsuya, I go by Harry One.”</p><p>“That’s me,” she gives a quick bow in greeting, and holds out a pastry. “I bought this for you. Thank you for giving me a ride.”</p><p>“Thanks,” Harry One says, taking the pastry with surprise and genuine gratitude. He tucks it away into the side pocket of his backpack. “Come on, that’s our ride. You ever been on a motorbike before, Silica-san?”</p><p>“Never,” Silica says. He steps over to the bike, grabs the black helmet resting on the seat, and pulls it on.</p><p>“Your lucky day then,” Harry One says, flipping the visor up, “You’re gonna need to take out your pigtails though.”</p><p>He produces another sleek black helmet from his backpack for her, handing it to her after she's done finger combing her hair out, hair ties flipped around her wrist. Her school bag and pastry go into his mostly empty backpack, which goes on her shoulders. He swings a leg over the bike first, then turns to her.</p><p>“When you get on, you can put your feet here. It’s not required to hold on to the driver, but since it’s your first time, it’s better to be safe. You can put your hands on my sides, and hold on tight. I’ll tell you if I need you to loosen up, so don’t worry about me, okay?”</p><p>Silica nods, and swings a leg over the bike, settling behind him carefully.</p><p>“All set?”</p><p>“Good to go,” she replies. He starts the bike, and they’re off.</p><p>-</p><p>When they get to the Dicey, Harry One follows her in. Agil gives her a quick once over, and once assured of her general wellbeing, sets them up on the bar counter. Harry One unpacks his backpack, pastries and all.</p><p>“Great, you’ve got food. You should eat and drink some water, Silica-chan, Lisbeth is on her way,” Agil tells her, nodding in greeting to Harry One. Silica nods and starts picking at her pastry, feeling her shoulders relax for the first time in hours. The Dicey is a safe zone. Agil and Harry One are both solid allies watching her back. Halfway through eating her pastry, she nearly chokes when Lisbeth bursts through the doors and throws herself at Silica.</p><p>“Are you alright, what happened?” she says, frantically patting Silica down.</p><p>“I’m fine,” Silica shrinks back a little, clutching her half eaten pastry. “I’m not hurt.”</p><p>“But something happened,” Lisbeth says, eyes shrewd, “Something scared you, badly.”</p><p>“I was on the train and there was this guy, and… there’s not a Harassment Prevention Code IRL,” Silica says, looking at her hands twisting in her lap. Lisbeth gasps and Agil hisses wordlessly.  “I panicked. I went at him with a pen because I didn’t have anything else, and then I ran out of the train like a crazy person. And then I called you.”</p><p>“You called me crying, Silica,” Lisbeth says, sitting down next to her at the bar, “That’s <em> not fine</em>.”</p><p>“Easy there, man,” Agil says. Silica and Lisbeth look over to see Harry One letting go of his white knuckle grip on his glass of soda. He takes a deep breath.</p><p>“Please excuse my curiosity, Silica-san,” Harry One says, “How old are you again?”</p><p>“Fourteen,” she says. Harry One’s grimace split into a snarl. He visibly folds his anger back, his shoulders deliberately, carefully loosening even as the muscle in his jaw jumps.</p><p>“It sounds like you did good,” he says, then frowning thoughtfully, adds, “You’re young. Did you get him in the eyes? Was he bleeding?”</p><p>“Cheek, I think. He bled a little, maybe, but I still have the pen,” Silica says, a little wide eyed.</p><p>“Hmm,” Harry One hums, “I can’t say I’m not a little disappointed, but it’s probably for the best. If you’d gotten his eyes, he might try to make a counter argument for some kind of assault. As is, if the scum decides to be an idiot and tries to press charges, you’ve got a clear cut case for self defense, especially given your age.”</p><p>“Is that a legit assessment?” Agil says, raising an eyebrow.</p><p>“I dated an attorney once, picked a few things up,” he says, shrugging, “At least two years out of date though, but hopefully you won’t need an official opinion anyways.”</p><p>“Good to know,” Lisbeth says, “And he’s right, Silica, you did great. You defended yourself, got out of there, and called for backup.”</p><p>“But I panicked, I almost took out his eye!” Silica says, “I shouldn’t have. Panic kills in field. I <em> know </em> that.”</p><p>“You haven’t had to worry about something like this for two years straight, it’s no wonder you were caught off guard,” Lisbeth scoffs, “If the guy had a knife, you wouldn’t have panicked. Don’t you dare blame yourself for something like that. You survived. Next time you won’t panic. In fact, next time you’re going to have a taser. Or something!”</p><p>“Pepper spray,” Harry One leans forward to advise, “That close, a taser runs the risk of electrocuting people other than your target. Including you.”</p><p>“I’m going to have <em> what</em>? I don’t have any of those things, my parents haven’t ever bought anything like that,” Silica stammers.</p><p>“We’re going to get you some,” Lisbeth says, determined, “I’m not going to let you take the train with just a pen to defend yourself.”</p><p>“I guess it would be nice to have something more than a pen,” Silica says, remembering those frantic heartbeats when she’d reached for a blade and found nothing more than her school bag.</p><p>“Say, Silica-san,” Harry One says, leaning his chin on his hand, “What was your style in SAO again? I remember your spiky little dragon friend, so… Beast Tamer? What else?”</p><p>“Yeah, I was a mid level quester. I used a dagger,” Silica says.</p><p>“Well, I can’t help you with dragons, but daggers?” Harry One grins, tapping his mouth, “I might know a guy.”</p><p>“Okay, go pick a table where I can’t hear about any of this,” Agil says, shooing them away from the bar, “Then I can have my plausible deniability and you can get to talking about all those <em> very legal </em> self defense measures for Silica. And Yokota? They’re still in highschool. Tsuboi’s gonna hear about this.”</p><p>“I was gonna tell him myself,” Harry One nods, “And Argo, if she’s got the brain space to think about this kind of thing right now.”</p><p>“Good,” Agil says firmly. Once he’s back behind the bar, Harry One turns to them conspiratorially.</p><p>“Alright, let’s talk budget.”</p><p>-</p><p>On the weekend, Silica tells her mom she’s going out with friends and goes to browse through spiky key chains and mace and batons with Harry One and Lisbeth. The shopkeeper tries to be helpful, pointing out aggressive fancy items for Harry One and discreet conveniences for the girls. It’s not until Harry One asks about brass knuckles and knife regulations that he offers up any useful information. Silica zones out of their back and forth on specifics and paperwork, drawn to a display on the other side of the room between the katana and the shuriken.</p><p>Tanto and wakizashi rest on black lacquered stands, sleek and beautiful. Silica picks one up, the blade as long as her forearm. It’s so smooth that she can see her own reflection in it. The balance isn’t particularly good on this show blade, but the sight of it in her hand feels so right she wants to cry. She carefully puts the tanto back. She can’t hide something like that from her parents. Someday she’ll have her own place and her own money and be old enough to legally buy her own. Someday. Her gaze lingers even as she turns away.</p><p>They leave the shop with two bottles of mace apiece and two cat shaped keychains Silica and Lisbeth can use like brass knuckles.</p><p>“We have another stop,” Harry One says, “Fair warning, it’s kind of shady, but you’ll have a chance at things normal shops won’t carry.”</p><p>It ends up being some guy’s apartment in a neighbourhood Silica’s parents would have never let her walk through alone. Or at night. Or pretty much ever. Silica’s caught by the combat knives the guy keeps in stock, poking through them as Harry One argues with the guy a little.</p><p>“Dude, they’re kids!”</p><p>“What’s it to you?” Harry One shoots back.</p><p>“Do they know how to keep their mouths shut?” he hisses.</p><p>“Yeah man, they’re good. I wouldn’t have brought them here if I couldn’t vouch for them,” Harry One rolls his eyes. The guy gives him a dubious look.</p><p>“I don’t carry anything cutesy,” he warns, looking their way.</p><p>“We can get that from other places,” Lisbeth waves him off, then turns to Harry One, “Maybe one of the longer knives for Silica?”</p><p>“Are you looking to carry in public legally or illegally?” the guy asks, pulling on a professional persona at the mention of a prospective sale.</p><p>“Legally,” Harry One cuts in, eyeballing the dagger Silica got her hands on. When she pouts, he gives her a look. The guy doesn’t miss the exchange.</p><p>“Hey, legal doesn’t mean it can’t be wicked as hell,” he says, “Let’s find you something badass.”</p><p>They do. Silica thanks Harry One when he drops her off at the Dicey and takes her things home. That evening, she makes sure her door is shut and lights the incense at her pictureless little desk shrine.</p><p>“I’ve got good people to party with, and I’m working on getting my own teeth, Pina,” she whispers, “They aren’t much, but they’re a start. You don’t have to worry about me.”</p><p>-</p><p>Silica’s used to daggers that are closer to short swords in length, but Harry One insisted they stay within legal carrying limits, <em> just in case you ever actually have to use them, Silica-san, it’ll be easier if we don’t have to worry about broken regulations on top of whatever - or whoever - you knifed. </em> Her new balisong is prettier than any blade she’s ever seen IRL, iridescence glimmering in the light. Her other one is right at the length limit, a no-nonsense black combat knife with a gleaming sharp edge.</p><p>There’s a bit of a learning curve with these smaller knives, and Harry One suggests both she and Lisbeth learn how to throw a proper punch so that their little cat keychains can make maximal impact. Her parents are happy to sign her up for a few self defence classes, and she keeps her knife practice out of their sight and in the privacy of her room. Sometimes, if the Dicey doesn’t have anyone but her and her friends, she practices there too, flipping her balisong around her knuckles under Agil’s watchful eye.</p><p>Having blades again makes something in her settle. The paranoia that used to chew on Silica’s brain doesn’t disappear, but it quiets at the weight of her combat knife strapped to her thigh, at the thump of the balisong handle hitting her palm. There’s danger out in the world, but she is a little bit dangerous too now.</p><p>-</p><p><em> Reminder I’m not coming to the Dicey today, big family dinner, </em> Lisbeth texts her right after the bell rings. Silica quickly taps out a reply, absentmindedly grabbing her bag and standing.</p><p>“Ayano!” Silica glances up. Her classmate beckon her over to the other side of the room, where a few of them have pushed their desks together by the windows. “We decided to eat in here today! Pull up a chair!”</p><p>“Oh! Sure,” she says, plopping herself into the nearest chair and digging out her lunch. The conversation washes over Silica, her school friends investigating each other’s lunches. Silica smiles as she listens to one of her friends chattering about this hot new rock band he’s been really into, here, he’ll pull up an MV on his phone so they could see -</p><p>The classroom door flies open with a bang. Without thinking, Silica whirls, flips a desk between her and the door, and hits the ground behind it for cover, reaching for the knife under her skirt. She freezes when her fingers find only skin.</p><p>“Sorry! I didn’t mean to open the door so hard! Guys? Are you okay?” It’s one of her other classmates.</p><p>“I’m fine!” Silica sounds off, automatic. She looks around frantically as the rest of them answer in turn. Her friends are all on the ground with her, chairs and desks overturned, just like her. Some of them are clutching chopsticks or rulers like blades, tense and ready to sprint forward at a moment’s notice. One of them is already crying. A few of their lunches hadn’t survived, rice scattered on the floor.</p><p>That’s going to be annoying to clean up, Silica thinks, only a little hysterically. She stands up, pushing her way past her shaken classmates. There’s her bag, where’s her balisong - Silica stares down at the contents of her bag. She forgot her knives today. Silica <em> forgot her knives </em> , <em> oh god, she’s going to die - </em></p><p>She snatches up her phone, tears away from her classmates, and hurtles down the hall, chased by their startled exclamations.</p><p>No way to get to a safe zone, she had to figure out where her party members were -!</p><p>Silica throws herself up the stairs until she gets to open air, slams the door behind her, and stabs her password at her phone. Her mind races, heart pounding loud in her ears as she scans through her contacts. One name makes her pause, and she hesitates - but he might be on his lunch break so it might be fine - her finger presses down.</p><p>“Moshi moshi,” Harry One greets.</p><p>The words pour out of her like a waterfall. “It’s Silica, I’m sorry, I must be interrupting your break, I shouldn’t have called, oh god.”</p><p>“Hey, slow down,” Harry One interrupts, “What’s up?”</p><p>“I might,” Silica gasps out, feeling like she’s out of her mind, “I might need a ride home from school today. If you’re free.”</p><p>“Did something come up?” he asks, concern creeping into his voice.</p><p>“I forgot my knives today,” Silica chokes out, and she looks at her hand and realizes she’s shaking, “So I can’t take the train. Oh god, something’s wrong with me, I’m going to die, I can’t do this, I can’t breathe-”</p><p>“Whoa, okay, uh, hold on.” She can hear the sound of tapping as Harry One does something to his phone. “I think you might be having an anxiety attack, I’m just searching the internet how to help, hold on, okay? We’re gonna get through this.”</p><p>Silica makes a wordless sound of acknowledgement, feeling like the air is choking her, feeling like she can’t-</p><p>“Okay, I can hear you hyperventilating, let’s try slowing your breaths. In for ten, out for ten, okay? With me now.”</p><p>Fifteen minutes of struggling to breathe feels like an eternity. Lisbeth finds her at some point, wrapping her in a grounding hug as she listens to Harry One on the phone. When it’s over, Silica slumps into Lisbeth’s shoulder, and they stay like that for the rest of lunch break.</p><p>-</p><p>When Harry One shows up at school, the first thing he does is tuck a little pocket knife into her hand. He takes her to the Dicey on his bike again. Silica waves off Lisbeth’s offer to come with them; she couldn’t let her own mess get Lisbeth into trouble with her family. Silica lets Agil’s concern and mother henning wash over her like a warm, familiar hug.</p><p>“Everything I’ve looked up says you should talk to your counsellor about this, Silica-chan,” Harry One says, “They say anxiety attacks are really treatable.”</p><p>“Yeah,” Silica says, feeling wrung out, “Okay. That was awful. I don’t want to do that again.”</p><p>“You said it was because you forgot your knives. Do you think that’s what triggered it?”</p><p>Silica laughs, a little hollow. “Definitely. I realized I didn’t have them and I. I just booked it.”</p><p>Harry One hums, sipping his drink. “I’m a little surprised you called me before Lisbeth, though.”</p><p>“I saw your name in my contacts first. And I knew you would understand about my knives.”</p><p>“Huh. I’m honoured by your trust, O Dragon Master,” Harry One says with a roguish grin.</p><p>Startled into laughter, Silica shakes her head ruefully. “Man, I just wish I didn’t need my knives so badly. It’s not like Lisbeth needs something like that.”</p><p>“Lisbeth was a support, she didn’t spend as much time as you in the field. You’re a dagger specialist, it makes sense that carrying helps now,” Harry One counters, raising an eyebrow.</p><p>“Kirito,” Silica says, pointedly.</p><p>Harry One sighs. “I’ll be on my knees thanking God if nobody ever emulates Kirito’s coping mechanisms. Everything Klein says about him sounds like he’s really not dealing well. But seriously, Silica-chan, there are definitely other survivors who are going through the same thing. Don’t worry about it too much.”</p><p>“You know other players that have to carry?” Silica asks, curious.</p><p>“Yeah, plenty,” Harry One says, then adds dryly, “One even stares at me in the mirror everyday.”</p><p>“Oh,” Silica says, startled, “Is that why you offered to take us knife shopping?”</p><p>“Partly. Partly also cause solos like you and Lisbeth and Kirito don’t have guilds to take care of you, and Fuurinkazan, we figure someone should look out for you, ya know?”</p><p>Silica used to wonder what having siblings was like. She’s pretty sure she doesn’t have to wonder anymore.</p><p>“Thanks, Yokota-nii,” she says, just a bit cheeky, and laughs as he splutters.</p><p>-</p><p>So Silica talks to her counsellor, keeps her knives close at hand, and carries on. There are days she doesn’t want to get out of bed, but she hauls herself up anyways because that’s just what you had to do sometimes. Silica doesn’t have Agil’s rock solidness or Lisbeth’s no-nonsense practicality or even Kirito’s ability to bend and bend without breaking, but she’s good at carrying on so long as she’s not alone. And she’s not.</p><p>In the evenings, Silica lights incense at her desk and knows that Pina would be proud of her.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. spidersilk</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Argo wakes up and puts herself to work.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>as usual, i have done absolutely no technical research<br/>to the person who semi-recently commented on ch1 asking if this was a series: yes, here you go!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>As soon as Hosaka Tomo can physically type, which is pretty much right after she wakes, she’s asking for her phone and her laptop. Her older sister, Kyou, has restarted her phone plan with data so she doesn’t have to try to slog through the crappy hospital wifi. She logs back into all of her major social media accounts, checking the feeds for the public reaction to the SAO survivors. There's been a lot of shock so far, but only a bare bones statement from the government. Her eyes narrow. Tomo has a lot of allies and zero intel on if any of them made it out alright, and the government hasn’t even released the number of survivors - yet, anyways.</p><p>A quick internet search yields a few names of government representatives handling the SAO incident. The nurses don’t come by that often since Tomo’s not in critical condition, and she’s already done with physiotherapy for today. That means she’s got hours with only a few check ins from the nurses, who will be easy to distract. She stretches her neck and gets to work. Three hours later, she’s hacked into three emails and found the highly secured server where the government is keeping, amongst other things, the names and usernames of the SAO survivors. Not something she could get into from her hospital bed, but she had a few connections who owed her favours, if they were still active black hats.</p><p>Tomo grins. Argo’s back online.</p><p>-</p><p>“You finding your friends okay?” Kyou asks, two days later. Only a few hours after Tomo had woken up, Kyou had come in for her weekly visit and had nearly broken Tomo’s spine with the ferocity of her hug. Apparently their father had swung by to speak with the doctors at some point, but Tomo had been asleep, wrung out from starting PT. Their mother has been out of the country on business for three weeks now and isn’t expected back for another two. It’s about what Tomo expected - her parents have always been distant, Kyou half raised by their now dead grandmother, and Tomo half raised by Kyou.</p><p>“Yeah,” she mumbles, distracted as she tries to hack into A-chan’s email, “Mostly, anyways. There’s this one friend of mine - getting out was kind of hectic and everyone thought she died, but I got new intel that she might have made it out, so I’ve been trying, but I haven’t gotten any response... Huh.”</p><p>“What’s up?”</p><p>“She hasn’t logged into her email since before SAO. Or any of her social media accounts.”</p><p>“Maybe her parents aren’t giving her access yet?” Kyou says, but the skeptical furrow of her brows tell a different story. The internet is the fastest way to catch up on two years of information, and at this point, most survivors have tons of time to kill between sleeping and PT. There isn’t really any good reason for Asuna not to have internet access yet.</p><p>“Hopefully that’s all. Hacking hospital systems is a nightmare, and I used up a lot of favours already,” Tomo grimaces.</p><p>“What’s her name again?”</p><p>“Yuuki Asuna.”</p><p>“Why does that sound familiar?” Kyou says to herself, frowning.</p><p>“She’s the daughter of the RETCO CEO, you might have run into her at one of mom’s fancy work parties. You want a picture?”</p><p>“Ah, Yuuki Kouichirou’s sister? Never really talked to that guy,” Kyou says, “Might have seen her around, but I haven’t gone to that many events with mom. No, I’ve heard that name somewhere else…”</p><p>Tomo is excellent at remembering and navigating information, but Kyou has eidetic memory and a natural ability to run conversational circles around other people. Much like their parents, she stacks it with honed professional skill to outpace her opponents, only she rules the courtroom instead of the corporate world.</p><p>“I got it!” Kyou exclaims, snapping. “Suzume’s little sister. She had a friend called Yuuki Asuna. They said she was in a coma and they wouldn’t let anyone but family visit!”</p><p>“Small world,” Tomo comments, but she isn’t too surprised. Kyou’s girlfriend is old money, and Tomo had looked up the Yuuki family after digging up A-chan’s IRL name. They’re some of the oldest money in Japan. From what Suzume has said, people like that tend to know each other even just by sending their kids to the same schools.</p><p>“I can find out how she is for you,” Kyou says, “Suzume can probably help - since it’s the Yuuki, the rich-people gossip mill will be all over it.”</p><p>“Thanks,” Tomo says, warm with Kyou’s immediate support. Tomo doesn’t regret running solo in SAO, but this - this, she missed. Kyou’s only six years older than her, but she has always done her best to take care of Tomo, even at thirteen and grieving their grandmother. Now, Kyou comes to visit her every day, even with her long work hours and limited time with Suzume. Now, Kyou offers to slog through rumours and wheedle around condescending socialites just to find Tomo’s friend. Their parents’ disinterest has never mattered much to Tomo. She has always been loved.</p><p>Kyou comes back the next day to give Tomo the news and holds her through her frustrated tears. Asuna can’t be welcomed home, but nor can she be grieved. Kirito, caught in the whiplash between hope and disappointment, is a mess, and Tomo wonders how long they will have to go without closure.</p><p>-</p><p>Tomo does an absolutely great job holding herself together through phone calls and emails and DMs until she fails to track down one of her Army contacts. She’s not desperate enough to hack medical information to find AWOLan, but she still needs to talk to the Army, so she calls Thinker instead.</p><p>When she mentions all of this to Thinker, he goes quiet for a moment too long, and Tomo tenses.</p><p>“Argo,” Thinker says with an audible swallow, “I’m sorry to break the news to you. He… AWOLan is dead. He killed himself three days ago. I only heard because I know his cousin IRL.”</p><p>Argo feels like she’s been punched in the gut. In SAO, there had been players who had jumped off the railing. The reasons varied, and while it wasn’t too common, it wasn’t unheard of, and Argo heard <em> a lot</em>. Still, that was supposed to be SAO, where anyone could die. Where anyone did die. This was real life. It was supposed to be safe.</p><p>“That really sucks, Thinker,” Argo whispers, throat thick, “Thank you for telling me.”</p><p>If she had thought the news of Asuna and the SAO sleepers shook her, AWOLan’s death feels like free falling, and it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Argo does her crying where the nurses can’t see and spends hours tracking down the rest of her network. There has been a score of suicides, a much wider swathe of various kinds of breakdowns, and she has to know, Tomo crafted Argo to <em> know</em>, so she runs the numbers and muffles her sobbing with her pillow. She hears one informant who is worried that her bad habit of numbing everything with alcohol will turn into addiction, another in her contacts who admits he’s been cutting himself a little every morning, because SAO hadn’t had pain, so if he could feel it, he knew this was reality. They had made it through SAO, but Argo wasn’t sure how many of them were going to make it through this.</p><p>Kayaba’s final act - and it probably wasn’t even intentionally malicious, which made Argo even more furious - was to tear apart the survivors. It was the last final straw that was sending so many of them off the edge. Every player needed someone they could trust, even solos like Argo and Kirito, who had chosen to drift between points of contact like stray cats rather than pick a pack to run with. Argo’s contacts are clinging to her like she’s their last lifeline, too many of them afraid and lost and unable to find people to lean on IRL, and Argo doesn’t know how to do this. She’s a solo for a reason.</p><p>But being alone kills, and you never leave a party member behind.</p><p>“Not on my watch,” Argo whispers in the dead of night to an audience of ghosts.</p><p>-</p><p>Tomo explains the threads of her ideas to Agil over video call. He takes a few minutes to think over her words from his own hospital room.</p><p>“Restarting SAO player communications could be really good, and I’m down to back you,” he starts, “But I think you need to talk to my wife.”</p><p>“Your wife?” Argo asks, reflexively probing for more information.</p><p>“Kathy Mills. She’s good at this kind of stuff, I can give you her number,” Agil sighs, and gives her a look that says he knows exactly what she’s doing.</p><p>Agil, as usual, is right. Kathy is interesting to research. After SAO had taken Agil, she had started a small SAO family support group that exploded into an organization even the task force would hear out. Kathy was never the face of any of the projects, but her name was clearly listed amongst all the other leaders on the SFS website, and Argo had a feeling her involvement went deeper than anyone outside the organization could tell.</p><p>When Kathy visits her hospital room, Tomo is struck by how short Kathy is. Tomo’s a tiny teenage girl herself, and it isn’t too often she meets adults who she doesn’t have to look up at. Kathy’s height aside, she’s got the same feel of dependability that Agil does, and she listens just as carefully as Tomo lays out her ideas again.</p><p>“If communication is the end goal, and security of personal information is the most major problem, can you just take personal information out of the equation? What if everyone went by screen name?” Kathy asks. Tomo turns the thought over in her brain.</p><p>“Someone would have to know, to get things set up,” Tomo muses, “And we’d need a whole new system to match IRL communications with username data. It’s doable.”</p><p>“What kind of method of communication were you thinking of originally?”</p><p>“I grabbed people’s emails or numbers to get in contact with them, personally. And originally I was trying to get people’s friend lists to them, with IRL methods of contact. But if we’re doing screen names...”</p><p>“What if you just put them all together and let people do the heavy lifting of finding each other again? Like a social media app, with usernames locked to SAO screen names. And it would be a lot easier to ensure everyone can get to the resources you want to share.”</p><p>“Is that too chaotic? Maybe sorting people by guild would make it easier, and we’d need some kind of directory or search function… it would have to be able to handle six thousand people, and we would need rooms and group chats for guilds and parties, forums for topics and resources. If we’re trying to make the system match username data, we could send invitations and then restrict access to channels until people are verified, but that’s also a ton of people. Maybe we could put together some kind of automated method of screening…”</p><p>Plans spin out from there, Tomo weaving ideas together even as Kathy helps her untangle details and patch holes with the eye of experience. Kathy has brilliant suggestions for the resource list, like compiling a list of job hunting resources, or creating a network of volunteers for emergency help. Tomo makes spreadsheets of people to contact for the multitudes of teams they’ll need to set up, and Kathy starts calling up SFS members.</p><p>While Kathy galvanizes the SFS, Tomo pushes herself to get basic organization hierarchy up before she has to go back to school. Kirito is walking through life in a haze, but he obeys the doctors, and he listens when she tells him to join her team of programmers who are setting up their server. One of Argo’s low level ALS contacts has a background in teaching and gets recruited to work with Agil and a few other SFS staff on training volunteers and sorting regulations on working with minors. Kyou immediately pitches in to help Kathy and Yulier sort out finances and legalities, from paying for server space to figuring out a financial support system funded by the SFS. Their meetings are full of unimaginably complicated adult things. Argo doesn’t know anything about tax deductions and is savouring the few years she has left before she’ll have to learn.</p><p>It takes five months of furious building, punctuated by the rush of moving home, the joy of Asuna waking up, and the stress of restarting school. They’re so close she can taste it.</p><p>-</p><p>Here’s the thing: if they wanted to reestablish SAO communications, the guild leaders and other influential players were going to have to be on board. Community aside, SFS had taught Kathy that organization was key to making sure all the details were accounted for. If they didn’t want people to fall between the cracks, they had to be organized, and to be organized, they needed clear leaders. Even if Tomo could just get the leaders on board for a few months to pass the baton to someone else, it would be enough.</p><p>So Argo calls a boss meeting. </p><p>On the day of the meeting, Tomo puts on her whiskers like she’s putting on war paint. They had gone back and forth on who would speak, and Tomo isn’t any kind of public speaker - even as Argo, she had always preferred one-on-one conversations, but Asuna had put her foot down. This wasn’t just for the clearers or just for the Knights of Blood. Argo’s project is for all SAO survivors, so the speaker would have to be Argo, well-known and well-liked but unallied to any guilds.</p><p>Still, Asuna had helped her write and practice the speech, and now she’s sitting with Kirito right next to the bar at the Dicey in a show of support. Kirito leans over to say something to Asuna, his voice lost under the chatter of the crowd, then glances over at Argo and gives her a thumbs up. Argo nods to them. She checks her phone. It’s ten minutes past the set meeting time, so everyone who would have come should be here. She swings her legs up onto Agil’s bar counter. A hush falls over the crowd as she stands.</p><p>
  <em> Showtime. </em>
</p><p>“Thank you for coming today. Most of you know me as Argo the Rat. I’ve called you to this boss meeting because of information I have that pertains to all of us.” Thoughtful murmurs spill out across the room.</p><p>“As SAO survivors, we’ve lost a lot. We’ve lost two years of our lives, comrades, friends. I’m sorry to say that we are still losing. Since escaping SAO, multiple players have taken their lives. Many more are having trouble finding work. A lot of kids are struggling to readjust to home and school. There are a multitude of problems and threats cropping up - to list them all now would take this whole meeting.</p><p>“Some of you may say that none of this concerns you, that it is not your fault or your responsibility if someone else has problems. And you wouldn’t be wrong. But these issues still affect all of us. Public sentiment towards SAO survivors has been balanced on a knife’s edge these past six months. One flick in the wrong direction, one survivor panic getting too much publicity, and what will they think? What will the government do? What will happen to our job and school prospects? We’re already starting to see negative reactions. For all of its positives, SAO Returnee School has mandatory counselling for students, and they are actively looking for anyone who isn’t coping well, not to help them, but to keep them controlled and socially acceptable. They’re <em> afraid </em> of high school students who are just a little different from everyone else. <em> The nail that sticks up gets hammered down. </em></p><p>“This is every survivor’s problem. It’s not right and it’s not fair, but all of you know that life is not fair, and all of you are people who fought for us anyway. I know that because I am one of you, and if I have to fight for us IRL, then that is what I will do. I refuse to lose anymore,” Argo says, hands fisting involuntarily, remembering tears and fury and hospital sheets, “Kayaba doesn’t get to <em> take </em> anymore.”</p><p>The room is utterly still, all eyes on her, air full of grief and rage so heavy Argo barely knows how to breathe. Every person at this meeting is someone who has looked despair in the eye and spat in its face, defiant until the bitter end. In the front row, Asuna’s eyes are bright with trust and determination, and her belief buoys Argo forward.</p><p>“In SAO, we made friends and party members and guildmates. We learned how to share information and resources and responsibilities. We learned how to <em> survive</em>. If we did it once, we can do it again. I want to re-establish SAO player communications. Job hunting, financial advice, homework help, even if you just need a hug - if we can talk to each other, we can help each other.</p><p>“Fellow survivors, may I present... SURNET, the Sword Art Online Survivor Network.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>- Argo's "new intel" about Asuna is from Kirito. She thought he died, but he's clearly alive, and he saw Asuna in the system after her avatar shattered, so they figure it's not unreasonable to hope that Asuna might be alive as well.<br/>- SFS = SAO Family Support group, I am uncreative at naming things<br/>- Black hats = hackers who do illegal stuff, I think. Heard this a time ago and no technical research was done, so who knows if the term is still used</p><p>I HAVE SO MANY THOUGHTS ABOUT KATHY. I'm saving them for later tho. Fun fact, Kyou was almost Kyo, Argo's older brother, and then I was like, I feel like older sisters are more pressured by society to parent their younger siblings in the absence of strong parental figures. Suzume was always Suzume though.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>